Program handbooks

Nursing Assistant: Academic overview

Learning outcomes

  • Meet the Oregon State Board of Nursing requirements to be eligible for the Nursing Assistant certification exam in the state of Oregon.
  • Utilize effective communication skills with clients, family, and the healthcare team.
  • Document patient care activities accurately and in accordance with legal and ethical standards.
  • Apply established procedures for infection prevention including standard precautions or transmission based precautions in various healthcare settings. 
  • Utilize proper body mechanics to minimize harm to self and clients.
  • Skillfully provide holistic, safe and effective person-centered care to diverse populations.
  • Provide safe care for clients that include meeting their basic needs for personal care, restorative care, mental health services, social needs, and patient rights. 

Curriculum

The NA program curriculum covers the basic skills to care for clients in care settings. Satisfactory completion of the course meets the Oregon State Board of Nursing requirements to be eligible for the Nursing Assistant certification exam in the state of Oregon.

The course sequence and class schedule will be provided in the syllabus. All course curriculum is OSBN required material to be completed for readiness to test for certification. 

Program highlights include:  Students spend 8 – 24 hours per week over 7 – 11 weeks: 40 hours clinical experience; 37 hours of classroom time; 28 hours of lab skills training. CPR certification is offered to students that do not have current AHA approved BLS certification. 

Learning environments

In the NA program learning environments, professionalism is expected. The faculty have both the right and the responsibility to ensure the learning environment attends to the learning needs of the class as a whole.

Skills lab

The clinical skills lab is a learning environment where students practice hands-on skills. During lab sessions, students take turns acting as both the nursing assistant and the patient, allowing them to experience both perspectives and incorporate patient-centered insights  into each skill. Students are evaluated on technical performance of skills. The skills must be observed and signed off by an instructor on the Oregon State Board of Nursing (OSBN) Lab Skills Checklist that will be provided in class. 

Students must complete practice of all required skills by the last scheduled day of the lab. Failure to do so may result in ineligibility to proceed to clinical and could jeopardize completion of the NA program during the current term. 

Clinical placements

See the Fieldwork section.

Technical standards

The standards and authorized duties for nursing assistants listed in the Oregon State Board of Nursing requirements for Nursing Assistant Certification can be found in OAR 851-063-0010.

The PCC Nursing Assistant program and Accessible Education and Disability Resources will provide reasonable accommodations to qualified students with disabilities, which may include auxiliary aids and or program modifications. Contact the Nursing Assistant program at NA@pcc.edu regarding any concerns about these requirements.

Grading

The NA course is set up to assess students on a Pass/No Pass grade system. Successful completion of course quizzes and the final exam with a grade of 75% or above is necessary to pass the course. In addition, students must accurately perform a demonstration of required clinical skills in labs and the clinical rotations to pass the course.  

Faculty will assess student readiness to take the NA certification test through OSBN over the length of the course. Students that do not demonstrate their readiness to test may still pass the course, however, may be advised to suspend scheduling the certification exam until readiness to test is achieved.  Faculty will provide the student feedback about areas of focus to support readiness.  

Students are expected to take responsibility for their own learning and understanding. In order to evaluate student progress, there are a variety of assessment situations. 

  • Assessing knowledge of content is done through multiple choice quizzes and a final exam. 
  • Evaluation of skills is done by student demonstration in the campus lab. The required skills  must be observed by an instructor and signed off on the Lab Skills Checklist provided in class. Skills must be successfully completed in the skills lab prior to being performed in the clinical setting. 
  • Application of skills in the clinical setting includes being checked off on skill demonstration by faculty.  The required clinical skills must be observed by an instructor and signed off on the Clinical Skills Checklist provided in class.

The Nursing Assistant program is required by the Future Ready Oregon grant to report student progress. We ask our students, who are getting scholarships and wraparound support from this grant, to help the program by participating in course evaluations and questionnaires. Feedback from students, instructors, and employers, help to continually improve the program.

Exams

The final exam is a knowledge test designed to prepare the student for readiness to complete the OSBN certification exam as a nursing assistant in the state of Oregon. The exam is an 80 question multiple choice exam with a 90 minute time limit. The exam contains 11 domains (topic areas) that include topics such as: 

  • collaboration with the healthcare team
  • communication and interpersonal skills
  • person-centered care
  • infection prevention including standard or transmission-based precautions
  • safety and emergency procedures
  • documentation
  • activities of daily living
  • observation and reporting
  • mental health and social service needs
  • technical skills
  • end of life care.

Exam administration

The final exam is proctored and will be available on testing day for students who have completed the requirements of didactic (lecture) and lab. Students must receive a passing grade of 75% or above to begin their clinical experiences. 

Students with a documented disability need to communicate with Accessible Ed and Disability Resources. Accommodations for testing will then be shared with the program director. Students are responsible for initiating testing accommodation requests.

Advising and counseling

The NA program director is available to all NA students for advising. Please email them directly to set up a time to meet either on campus or on Zoom. Stay connected and meet regularly with one of the program advisors listed in the program Contacts section. Refer to the PCC Advising webpage for more information.

Professionally trained counselors are also available to assist students. Help is available for matters such as learning difficulties and study skills, development, and exploration, as well as for family, personal, and social problems. Counselors are a good source of information about the college and its programs, community resources, etc. The Counseling Office provides drop-in, individual, and crisis counseling.  A referral to a counselor can be made through the program staff if desired.

Learning support

The PCC Nursing Assistant program recognizes that the nursing assistant course is fast paced and that some students may benefit from additional resources and support if they are struggling to keep up with the pace, or need help with understanding the course topics. 

All students are encouraged to stay connected with their Career Pathways Career Coach who can provide referrals to helpful services and resources. See also the Support services section at the end of this handbook. 

Withdrawal and re-entry

Withdrawal

Students in the program who do not progress due to academic performance, voluntary withdrawal, or life circumstances may have the opportunity to be readmitted into the program. Students are encouraged to confer with the program director before leaving the program. If students are considering dropping from the program, faculty or the program director may have solutions to help students remain in the program. The student is responsible to notify the program director and disclose the reason for withdrawal within one week of withdrawal in order to be eligible to re-enter the NA program when offered in future terms. 

Re-entry

Readmission is considered on a case-by-case basis and is subject to the guidelines below, program capacity, and admission criteria and program costs at the time of re-entry.

  • Re-entry. Students will be evaluated on criteria such as whether they withdrew voluntarily, failed the course (NP), had performance and/or conduct issues, and whether there were safety concerns in lab and clinical settings.  
  • Students are likely to be considered for program re-entry if the student is in good academic standing, had good attendance (classroom, lab, clinical), demonstrated safe performance in lab and clinical environments, initiated withdrawal before 25% of course completion with supporting documentation of reason to withdraw, demonstrated behavior aligned with Student Code of Conduct, and has a willingness to submit a plan for success if needed.
  • Students are most likely not eligible to be considered for re-entry in cases of “no shows” to course activities, no communication about a decision to withdraw from course, unresolved or active performance and Code of Conduct violations or a past expulsion. 
  • Students eligible for re-entry are allowed no more than one additional re-entry into the program. 

Failure, Dismissal, and Appeals

Students that demonstrate behavior that is of concern related to a professional standard or ethic in the lecture, lab or clinical setting could be considered for dismissal and failure of the course. The Due process for violations will be adhered to in these circumstances. 

Academic resources

The following are commonly used links that are helpful for the academic journey.

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